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Friday 21 Nov 2014

Have your say on rail industry plan for growth on routes to London Waterloo

Region & Route:

| Southern: Wessex

| Southern

Plans to make sure the railway from London Waterloo to the south and south west of England can continue to accommodate the huge growth in passenger journeys have been published by the Network Rail-South West Trains Alliance – and members of the public are being encouraged to have their say as part of a 90-day consultation period.

The Wessex Route Study, put together with the help of Transport for London, the Department for Transport and train and freight operating companies, covers lines from London Waterloo to Reading, Southampton, Weymouth, Portsmouth and Exeter and includes suburban services in London and Surrey.

Those lines include some of the most congested sections of railway in Britain, with more than 55 trains arriving at London Waterloo every hour at the busiest times of day, and a significant amount of freight traffic operating to and from the Port of Southampton.

Tim Shoveller, chief executive of the Network Rail-South West Trains Alliance, said: “Our railway already carries more than 220m passengers a year, and that number is predicted to grow significantly in the years ahead.

“Work we are already doing over the next five years will make a huge difference, including lengthening suburban trains and reopening the Waterloo International Terminal. But we need to do more, and do it quickly.

“The plans we are proposing in this study mean we will be able to cope with a forecast growth of 40 per cent on main line [R1] services over the next thirty years. We are also looking at what kind of improvements we can offer in reliability and frequency by introducing new technology which will allow us to improve the network further.

“It’s fantastic that more and more people want to travel by train and we want to provide the railway to take them where they are going.”

The draft study identifies priorities for the period from 2019 to 2024 – and looks ahead to 2043.

Potential options include:

• New double-deck trains
• Electrification to Salisbury
• 125mph on some sections of track
• Flyovers at Woking and Basingstoke
• Extra platforms at Southampton Central and Guildford
• Development of cab based signalling and automatic train operation
• Extra track from Surbiton to Clapham Junction
• Crossrail 2